Los Angeles

Padilla Has Alternative to Breakup, Boroughs

City Council President Alex Padilla, who opposes putting a measure to create a borough system for Los Angeles on the November ballot, said he will offer a competing plan at a meeting of the council's rules committee today.

Padilla's proposal would establish a commission to investigate ways to improve the governmental structure of Los Angeles. The commission would not be required to develop a plan to divide the city into boroughs, or to necessarily recommend changing the way the city is run.

Padilla said he will offer his plan as an alternative to a proposal by Councilwomen Wendy Greuel and Janice Hahn that would allow voters to decide whether to decentralize Los Angeles government by dividing the city into boroughs.

The Greuel-Hahn plan is intended as an alternative to breaking up the city. Proposals to create separate cities in the San Fernando Valley and in Hollywood are bound for voters this fall.

But Padilla, a secession opponent, said Tuesday that he thinks the city should not rush into a new form of government just to defeat a breakup. And he said he does not believe that it is politically necessary to offer voters an alternative to secession.

"I don't think we need to manipulate or confuse the voters," Padilla said. "We will defeat secession on the merits."